The work of a stay-at-home mother has an annual monetary value of $138,095, up 3 percent from last year, according to a survey out today.

Those are some findings from the seventh annual Mom Salary Survey issued by Salary.com, a Waltham compensation software and consulting firm.

YOUR VIEW: How much are stay-at-home moms worth?

If paid the salary of the equivalent work that a stay-at-home mother performs, a woman would earn $138,095, the company said.

And if a working mother regarded parenting as a second job, that second job would command an annual salary of $85,939; that's on top of the money she earns in the work place, Salary.com said.

More than 80 percent of employers are actively recruiting mothers re-entering the work force, and among the reasons is that mothering hones such as work-place skills and virtues as multitasking, compassion, dependability, and people skills, Salary.com said.

"Mothers are not only talented; they're experienced managers, motivators, decision makers and client specialists after spending time in both the work force and as a mother," Salary.com senior vice president Bill Coleman said in a statement.

I think you are reading far too much into what essentially amounts to a “fun fact”.

They’re just showing how much a mom would be paid to do all this work if she was doing it for a customer rather than for love of home and family. It’s not like they just made the numbers up. It doesn’t prove anything about women being undervalued at all; no one expects a mother to be paid. No one’s outraged moms aren’t making this salary, they aren’t going on strike.

It’s just an intersting number in the same way statistics about the number of microscopic bugs in your house or how many cups of coffee the average person drinks every year are interesting.

We recently heard a story here in Indianapolis, about a mother who was sleeping, while her 3 year-old left the house. Luckily, they found the toddler wandering with just a t-shirt on, on one of our local interstate highways.

I wonder if someone like the mom in this story should be maybe getting more of a minimum-wage "mom job?"

This is ridiculous.... Did they break it down to how much sex pays/costs with dad, too? Was it broken down per act, or per position? Perhaps they had a “quantity discount” built in... Wait a minute, is it mom paying dad or dad paying mom on that one. I guess it depends on what week it is... Ummm..., don’t get off, well..., only costs half as much.

That’s like the RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America) telling us how much money they’ve been losing through illegal downloading. And then making up some whopping figure that it supposedly represents. They (RIAA) haven’t figured out that no one would buy it, if they paid the ridiculous prices they have on the package. Thus, there’s *no money to lose* — since it would have never been purchased in the first place.

So, in the mom’s case, does the bill go to the kid, when they turn 18, or does the bill go to the dad? If to the dad, does the dad bill the kid? Perhaps the kids should be getting a deferred salary, too, for when they will be taking care of mom and dad in later years...

Of course, about the time that dad gets the bill for all this, he might look at his “work salary”, look at the bill for the wife and kids — and say to the wife —

“You keep the kids and I’ll get my own place; I think I can get a better deal with a new girlfriend and hiring an illegal alien once a week. Then you can bill the kids for the work you do for them...”

Hey! If it’s an “open marketplace” — this is what you get, “competitioin” and bargaining for the best price. I’m sure that they guy could shop around for a lot of girls and find a better “deal” — if *this* (above) was what it was all about...

I really hate these annual useless “reports” that come out. Like the “mexican food is gonna kill you”, next year “chinese food is gonna kill you”, and we’re supposed to accept all of it as fact, when it’s really a subtle method of brainwashing by the leftists in the media.

30
posted on 05/02/2007 12:57:14 PM PDT
by JacksonCalhoun
(CT native in exile in NC - we have moonbats here in Dixie, too)

Im a carpenter, electrician, plumber, painter, landscaper, I do tree removal, Im a chauffer, I cook, I clean, Im a nanny, I clean swimming pools, I do snow removal, roofing, and pest removal. My check for $250,000 seems to have been lost in the mail. Please send another.

Right on! My wife knows I do the bulk of work at home, which she (and most women) can't do. That includes carpentry, electrical, plumbing, landscaping. When it comes to remodeling, women will paint and put up wallpaper. I rip out walls and rebuild them with new wiring (electrical, phone, internet). Like you, I've also put on a roof. She won't touch plumbing; I've remodeled several bathrooms including piping and tiling.

And I've changed baby diapers, chaperoned kiddy field trips and also do the laundry! The article is plain silly.

I don’t know, in Los Angeles this could be accurate. A cleaning service will charge you about $100 for 3 hours (thats only for a 1 bedroom), and that happens everyday with kids, probably more. So figure at least $200 a day for cleaning. I’m going to go with the assumption that parents get no more than 10 days off per year, and work about a 16 hour day. So here we’re at $71,000, just for cleaning!

Eating out costs, what, $80 a day for three people? If you hired a chef it would be a heck of a lot more. Add $28,400 for cooking. Now we’re at $99,400.

What about errand runner? A good service down here in LA can cost you $20 per run, more depending on mileage and what it is. So if there is only one errand per day on average, thats another $7100, bringing us to $106,500.

You see where I’m going with this? That doesn’t include laundry, late nights with sick kids, etc etc etc.

Maybe so. I meant it’s silly, in terms of actually demanding pay like that. My wife would refuse to pay anyone else to do the chores I do, because it would bankrupt her. I’ve probably put over $200,000 worth of my labor into our current house. Sweat equity. Got a nice big profit from selling our last house. She does her part; I do mine. But we’re not about to “pay” each other. And I don’t think she would pay someone $100 to clean a bedroom; that’s what she has me for. Really. (I’m recently retired but she has a couple years to go before she retires.)

Disclaimer:
Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual
posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its
management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the
exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.